What is going on with the refs?

One thing we can all agree on is the refereeing has been very inconsistent, not just in the playoffs, but all season. And, it does appear we have things called against us that wouldnt get called on our opponent.

Let's get something straight. If Brodeur went down in such a dramatic fashion on a play like that, the Rangers would be calling it "the big flop". No one in their right mind can look at that and honestly say Lundqvist got hit with enough force to be impacted toward the back of his own net. I don't think he "dove", but he definitely "flinched" and fell backward afraid of Ponikarovsky, who's definitely not a small guy. Not only is there the intent to stop and NOT hit Lundqvist, but he barely even grazes him, so obviously he stopped in time. Phenomenal non-call; another more stressed out ref might have called either the dive or the goalie interference.

It's not a dive, but Lundqvist was definitely trying to sell the call by staying down instead of scrambling to get up. It's just incidental contact, not a penalty. This is one of those situations where a goal probably would have been waved off, but no penalty.

I thought the refs had a real bad game last night. But I don't think there's anything untoward going on. Dustin Brown has been the best penalty drawer in the league by far over the last few years. And with the Kings playing so well with the puck, it's only natural that they're going to draw more penalties than the opposition.

I think team reputation plays into it. The Devils aren't known as a high octane team that will draw a lot of penalties, so they don't.

The Devils also featured 2 of the biggest complainers the last few years, Clarkson and Langenbrunner, so refs tuned them out.

Devils also didn't help themselves with the Sykora penalty box thing. Referees have a long memory as a group, the reffing after the fat pig incident was atrocious, so even of its only subconscious, I think that incident hurts a little.

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I thought the refs had a real bad game last night. But I don't think there's anything untoward going on. Dustin Brown has been the best penalty drawer in the league by far over the last few years. And with the Kings playing so well with the puck, it's only natural that they're going to draw more penalties than the opposition.

So if PHX "embellished" a little more you don't think it's going to help them draw more PP's? What about the link that poster posted, sure showed a lot of Rangers and Kings on that list.

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of No OneProud to be King of the Kovalnuts (Est. June 2010 by MantaRay)

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The reffing isn't biased. It's just not very good or consistent. Go to any fan site, and you're gonna see posts just like these.

Yep, I tend to agree. During the Philthy series I was popping around some of their boards and they were moaning about how the refs were against them, we were getting the good calls, etc. (although pretty much everyone agreed that one game was wildly lopsided in the Cryers favor.... Was it game 2? I have already started to forget).

Anyway, I tend to think that the rule changes and the impetus to try to change the game by reinterpreting certain calls has left refs a bit stumped. However, if I was a bit more of a conspiracy theorist type I would really start to feel like the NHL had decreed from on high that they wanted an LA-NY Stanley Cup come hell or high water. Too bad for them the Devils are playing 'cuz we've brought the hell.

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Aaron / AEWHistory --- Rockies/Devils fan since 1981!

Trenton Makes and the World Takes..... Or.... Trenton Uses What the World Refuses

Nothing is "going on with the refs," it's just a very difficult game to officiate, and this time of year it becomes more difficult and every mistake is magnified because the stakes are higher.

I usually agree with this, but NOT calling Doughty for a textbook UFC double leg takedown until Doan goes back at him and then giving them matching minors at the end of that game last night was DISGRACEFUL.....there's NO WAY you can frak up a call like THAT......

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I thought the refs had a real bad game last night. But I don't think there's anything untoward going on. Dustin Brown has been the best penalty drawer in the league by far over the last few years. And with the Kings playing so well with the puck, it's only natural that they're going to draw more penalties than the opposition.

I see him and Callahan (not the only two who do it, but two of the most prominent) pulling the same routine over and over in games:

Step 1. Take a run at a guy and deliver an unnecessarily hard and slightly late, but not quite illegal, hit.Step 2. Stay nearby waiting for any sort of physical retaliation.Step 3. If anything at all comes, milk it for all its worth, hit the ice, and look in the direction of the nearest ref for the call.

This draws penalties nearly every time. The refs absolutely eat this sh!t up. They are always looking for any retaliation behind the play after a big hit, and they just love to dish out roughing minors for this sort of thing, even if the "retaliation" was nothing more than a light crosscheck or slash to the leg, which is significantly less severe than the sort of thing that goes on in post-whistle scrums all night long and doesn't get called then. It's all about the timing and embellishment. I think it's pretty trashy and dishonest, but I can see why fans of LA and NY love their ability to dish out a big(-ish) hit and then draw a penalty from it.

I usually agree with this, but NOT calling Doughty for a textbook UFC double leg takedown until Doan goes back at him and then giving them matching minors at the end of that game last night was DISGRACEFUL.....there's NO WAY you can frak up a call like THAT......

Here's the Doughty takedown. Keep in mind both him and Doan received penalties.

I usually agree with this, but NOT calling Doughty for a textbook UFC double leg takedown until Doan goes back at him and then giving them matching minors at the end of that game last night was DISGRACEFUL.....there's NO WAY you can frak up a call like THAT......

Here's the problem: Bryce Salvador did the EXACT same thing in the Flyers series and there was no call. If anything, Salvador's take down was more blatant IMO. Now this isn't to say that I disagree with you per se, but strangely enough this isn't an area where the refs have been inconsistent AFAIK. For some reason they have been consistently allowing these sorts of takedowns. I have absolutely no idea why and I wouldn't even venture much of a guess as to why either, but it would be difficult to argue that what happened in the kings-Yotes series was a penalty and not penalize the Devs as well.

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Aaron / AEWHistory --- Rockies/Devils fan since 1981!

Trenton Makes and the World Takes..... Or.... Trenton Uses What the World Refuses

It's possible the ref just didn't notice that Doughty grabbed Doan's leg and thought he took him down legally.

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It's possible the ref just didn't notice that Doughty grabbed Doan's leg and thought he took him down legally.

This. In every sport but baseball, the players have gotten too big and too fast for the refs to keep up. Replay has helped a little in football, but refs are going to miss a lot of calls in every sport just because they can't see them. Embellishers definitely get rewarded. It blows, but I don't think there's much that can be done to fix it, except maybe making the ice bigger to open things up more.

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Sumus Legio
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It took an awful lot of arguing from several posters to make the case that Poni shouldn't have a goaltender interference call. Regardless, the fact that they didn't call the penalty there, when they easily could have on a borderline play, means they don't have some agenda against the Devils. I also noticed nobody bothered to argue against the obvious interference penalty Parise should have had 30 seconds or so later. A borderline call and an obvious call go our way as the refs swallow their whistles in the last two minutes. If they wanted to give the game back to the Rangers in the last two minutes they could have, but didn't.

I'm wasting my keystrokes here though, there's no arguing with the tin-hat crowd, so continue your tirades against the reffing conspiracies in between History Channel specials on Roswell aliens, the JFK assassination, and the 9/11 Truthers.

The truth is: The players are too big for the field. The refs' cant see it all. The only solution is to put stripes on the linesmen in cases of blatant fouls. But you still have to have the refs' consult with them and some of those idiots have the God complex (like umpires).